
89 
and his private secretary. Eventually he settled in London, 
where he occupied the positions of Archdeacon or Chancellor 
in the metropolitan diocese ; during his later years frequent 
references were made to him under both titles. He, there- 
fore, successively held the important positions of Archdeacon of 
Bath, Canterbury, and London. From this period there is 
scant information to be gleaned concerning his life or death. 
He had long been desirous of obtaining some permanent 
engagement, or a living, in the Church, and had applied in 
vain to Pope Innocent III., to whom he had rendered many 
personal services. 
Through life his brilliant parts had rendered him a desirable 
agent on occasions of private and public emergencies, and he 
had been selected by high authorities for important offices 
and appointments, which he was always willing to undertake, 
however arduous and responsible, apparently indifferent to 
reward or emolument. 
Consequently envy and jealousy rankled in the minds of 
certain disappointed individuals in their efforts to supplant 
him, and in others, who may possibly have been over- 
looked, so that he was not without enemies in his later life. 
The several embassies with which he had been intrusted 
had supplemented the trifling income received as Archdeacon 
of Bath, yet both sources of income barely covered the re- 
quirements of his position, and he was unable to make pro- 
vision for old age. Towards the evening of his eventful life, 
with failing health and vigour, far away from his native 
land, he continued without adequate means of support, yet 
anxious to be engaged in clerical work. As the dark shadows 
of night gathered around him, many of his friends and rela- 
tives dead, and the remainder, mostly scattered abroad on 
the Continent, he no longer possessed the vivacity of spirit 
and the versatile genius that stimulated him when inditing 
the fresh and sparkling epistles of his younger days. 
Depression, the too frequent accompaniment of old age, 
overcame him, and in his extremity he addressed a plaintive 
appeal to Odo, Archbishop of Paris, requesting him to grant 
at least the means to dive in France, if a living there could not 
be given him, for he desired to end his days in his native 
country. His desire was not realised. In one of his last 
letters, Epistle No. 151, we have a mournful picture of his 
closing life ; deprived of nearly all his friends, with only a 
few clerical associates left; whilst retaining the office of 
